The Anhinga Trail

Anhinga

The workshop group spent a morning and then afternoon photographing around the Royal Palm Visitors Center and the Anhinga Trail.  Like I have previously said because of the high water levels, there was not a great number of birds, but what was there gave us great pictures.  The prettiest bird was the purple gallinule and as they were moving among the lily pads and feeding gave us good opportunities to photograph their beautiful color.

Purple Gallinule

Purple Gallinule

Purple Gallinule

Purple Gallinule

We were sitting on the stone wall overlooking the open water when two of us noticed an alligator swimming.  We both got up to photograph the alligator when it opens its mouth and gave us some interesting pictures.  Always be prepared.  You never know what is going to happen.

American Alligator

American Alligator

Here are pictures of other species that we saw.

Tricolored Heron

Double-crested Cormorant

Great Blue Heron

Anhinga

Green Heron

Luck with a Green Heron

Like many people say, and I agree with, be ready to shoot.  You never know what will appear.  Last month, prior to me coming down with bronchitis and falling and hurting my back I was down on the beach at Allens Pond photographing the shorebirds that were running around in front of me.  I was utilizing my 500 mm F/4 lens with a 1.7 converter on it on a tripod with a Rigid Gimbal Head.  Walking back to the field station, right at the culvert, I glanced to my left and in the bushes was a Green Heron.  From watching green heron activity, usually here in the north, if they notice you, they will fly right away.  I immediately set down my tripod and captured some pictures, even though I was shooting through some bushes.  The green heron started acting like it was going to dive down and capture a prey and I got a few pictures of this activity.  Then the heron straightened up and allowed me to adjust where I was photographing from and got some images of the heron with out the bushes in front.  What was great about it, there was two of us photographing the heron, and it did not fly away.  Sometimes luck is with you.

Green Heron

Green Heron Looking like It Is Going to Go after a Prey

Green Heron with with Its Neck Stretched out

Using the coupon code mborn you will receive a 15% discount on any or all of the Topaz plug-ins.



Help Support my blog by purchasing from Amazon. Clicking on this link and utilizing the link does not cost you anything.
BUY FROM AMAZON

World Shorebird Day

September 6 is World Shorebird Day https://www.facebook.com/worldshorebirdsday .  Counting actually can be done September fifth, sixth or seventh. I counted today because I will be out on the Atlantic ocean for two different trips on the sixth and seventh.  I had selected the beach loop at Allens Pond for the location where I would count.

Shorebird wise, there were not a lot of different species and a number of shorebirds, which is flying overhead.  There were a number of shorebirds feeding up and down the shoreline, so I just sat myself down with my big lens in front of me and waited till the shorebirds came to me.  This way, instead of me chasing them, and the shorebirds flying off.  I had a better chance at photographing.  There were a number of semipalmated plovers, in fact, one of them walked up to within 3 feet of me and stared right at me.

Semipalmated Plover

Semipalmated Plover, Looking at Me

The main bird feeding on the shore were sandelings, most of them were juvenile and they could be distinguished from the few adults by their nice clean feathers.

Sandeling Hiding in the Wrack Line

Sandeling Adult Changing into Winter Plumage

Juvenile Sandeling With Food in Its Mouth

Walking back to the field station, by the culvert a green Heron jumped up and then posed on a branch allowing some great pictures.

Green Heron

There is still time for you to participate in the world shorebird count you can join at this site http://worldshorebirdsday.wordpress.com/global-shorebird-counting/


If you live in the southeastern Massachusetts oh, Rhode Island area and are interested in winning a four hour in the field workshop with me, click here http://s.heyo.com/dbd1db

Little Blue Heron, and More at Daniel Webster

Juvenile Little Blue Heron

This Sunday was a beautiful morning with a great sunrise.  As I traveled to Marshfield to visit Daniel Webster Massachusetts Audubon Sanctuary.  The reason I traveled was because there have been reports of a juvenile Little Blue Heron present at the sanctuary.  Normally I have seen the juvenile Little Blue Heron down in Florida.  As opposed to the adult Little Blue Heron, the juvenile plumage is usually all white as opposed to the dark bluish-gray body that the adult has.

Arriving at the sanctuary, I walked down to the morning blind that overlooks the small pond.  The sanctuary has two blinds, a morning blind and an afternoon blind.  The blinds are positioned so the sun is coming over your shoulder and illuminating the creatures that are in front of you.  In the blind, there are screws that you can mount your tripod head on.  I set my gimbal head and attached my 500 mm F/4 lens starting out with a 1.4 converter and utilizing my Nikon D800.

Red-shoulder Hawk

The morning started out with a Hawk in the distance, and to capture it, I switched my converter to the 2X.  We then got a Green Heron closer was which required switching back to the 1.4 converter.  Later on, a Sandpiper appeared, which required the 2X converter plus changing the crop mode of my camera to 1.5, so that I could get a decent picture.  The question was, was this a Solitary Sandpiper or a Spotted Sandpiper.  After reviewing the pictures on my computer, there was no white notch before the wing, therefore, I called it a solitary Sandpiper.

Green Heron with its crest up

Solitary Sandpiper

This is a morning where I had to change from using converter's of various lengths to no converter's so that I get the photograph that I wanted.

All of a sudden, in front of us appeared the Little Blue Heron, which was so close that I almost had too much glass to take its picture.

Little Blue Heron

After finishing all of photography, I came home and downloaded the pictures and am thinking about returning again to Daniel Webster tomorrow.  The reason is that the plants and spiderwebs were covered with dew, and would make very interesting pictures.  The weather report is for fog in the morning so I hope we will get the great dew on the subjects.  This will require my macro lens, rather than my 500 mm lens.

Using the coupon code mborn you will receive a 15% discount on any or all of the Topaz plug-ins.



Help Support my blog by purchasing from Amazon. Clicking on this link and utilizing the link does not cost you anything.
BUY FROM AMAZON

Older Interesting Photographs

I have been slowly reviewing pictures that I took earlier in my career and what I have seen is how vastly that I have improved.  I was taking pictures with a high ISO of around 1600 in bright sun and a very high shutter speed.  As I been reprocessing these pictures, I had to removed a lot of noise.  Here is just a selection of some of my older interesting pictures.

Green Heron at Daniel Webster Massachusetts Audubon Sanctuary

"Who Is Watching Who" a whale watching trip Out to Stellwagon Bank and they humpback whale right next to the boat

Black-billed Magpie In Rocky Mount National Park

California Condor along the Big Sur

Cook's Chasm on the Oregon coast, where, when the tide comes in the waves, spray through a blowhole

Least Auklet on St. Paul, in the Pribilof's Located in the Bering Sea

Light-footed Clapper Rail, and endangered species located in the Tijuana Estuar y near San Diego, California

Mola Mola or Ocean Sunfish

Mute Swan and Cygnet

Whimbril in flight South Beach Chatham Massachusetts

A Mornings Birding at Wellfleet Bay Massachusetts Audubon Sanctuary

Today is Thursday and if you have been following my blogs.  Usually, you know that on Thursday's I go birding with my good friend Doug.  Today was no exception, we met at my house at 615 with Doug bringing delicious Starbucks coffee and we set out to bird on Cape Cod.  On the way.  We decided we would bird first at Wellfleet Bay, Massachusetts Audubon Sanctuary.  We arrived before the visitor center open, however, the trails are open beginning it sunrise.  Before we left the garden and the feeders.  We had seen 17 different species.  Perhaps the most interesting was a juvenile vesper sparrow, Juvenile Eastern Towhee who was perched on the sanctuaries solar panels. The hardest part of the day was trying to identify some of the sightings due to, the large number of juveniles.  We slowly made our way down toward the beach.  Prior to reach in the beach, the number of birds that we saw were low.  On reaching the beach area, there was a number of different shorebirds there, including Eastern and Western Willet's, Whimbrils, Greater Yellowlegs, plus a large number of different species out on the flats as the tide receded.  A saltmarsh sparrow gave us a great view of itself by perching on the marsh grass for a couple minutes, and allowing the to take its picture.







Near the shore was " a murder of crows".  Murder is the name given to a flock of crows.

Monarch was feading on flowers and there was extremely large number of Atlantic Marsh Fiddler Crabs, I observed a pair of male fiddler crabs fighting over a hole.

On the way walking back to the visitors center, at the pond, there was a beautiful green heron present, which was searching for food.

When we finally finished birding Wellfleet, we wanted to go further up on the Cape toward Provincetown, however, traffic was so backed up, so we decided to head off the Cape, but also decided to stop first and have some lunch.  We stopped at the Lobster Shanty on route 6, which is across the road from where the Cape Cod National Seashore Visitors Center Is located.  We had lobster salad, which was so large, and furnish me not only with lunch, but also with supper.

Red-winged Blackbird

Least Sandpiper

Greater Yellowlegs

Semipalmated Plover

Song Sparrow

"Tip-toeing Through the Sand" Western Willet

Western Willet and Short-billed Dowitcher

Western Willet and Short-billed Dowitcher

Whimbrel

Willet - Eastern